


No is the kindest word

by crackinthecup



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: 5+1 Things, Beleriand, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Horses, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Torture, M/M, POV Alternating, Tattoos, Time Skips, Tolkien Secret Santa 2020, Valinor, Years of the Trees, re-embodiment
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2020-12-24
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:14:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,583
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28284543
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crackinthecup/pseuds/crackinthecup
Summary: Celegorm’s life in snapshots, from his youth in Valinor to his eventual re-embodiment: six questions asked, only five of which were answered with a yes.
Relationships: Celegorm | Turcafinwë/Oromë
Comments: 10
Kudos: 37
Collections: Tolkien Secret Santa 2020





	No is the kindest word

**Author's Note:**

  * For [HoundsofValinor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/HoundsofValinor/gifts).



1

“Turcafinwë.”

Celegorm winced as his father’s voice cut through the silence of the sleeping house. He spun on his heel, trying to hide the bow he was holding behind his back. It was a clumsy attempt. The bow was taller than Celegorm by several inches, designed not for concealment but for the delight of onlookers. It had been plucked from Oromë’s armoury by the Vala himself: a temporary gift, given to Celegorm so he could practice and prove himself worthy of joining Oromë’s company. Even in the dark, Celegorm could see his father’s eyes lingering curiously on the intricately carved wood.

“It is late,” Fëanor said in a tired voice.

“I didn’t mean to wake you,” Celegorm replied, meeting his father’s gaze as levelly as he could. He thought about lying to him, telling him the bow was nothing more than a whim and that he would go back to his books in the morning. But as far back as he could remember, Fëanor had had an almost uncanny ability to know the minds and hearts of his sons. It made lying to him practically impossible, though that had never stopped any of them from trying.

“No need to worry, I was already awake.” Fëanor let out a heavy sigh, indicating the doorway to the kitchen; Celegorm could make out a stack of papers spread out over one of the counters under the blue glow of a crystal-lamp. “My work has kept me from my bed for long hours tonight. I was finalising some equations when I heard you creeping down the stairs.” Fëanor’s eyes flicked to the upper limb of the bow poking out from behind Celegorm’s back. “It seems your own work is just beginning. How long have you been practicing your archery?”

“Ah, right,” Celegorm mumbled, producing the bow from behind his back as though it had materialised there from thin air. “I started a couple of months ago.”

“Do you enjoy it?”

Celegorm nodded, unable to suppress a grin. “I get such a _rush_ from it. There’s nothing better than watching my arrows strike true.”

Fëanor smiled a genuine smile; it was a rare sight, and it softened the proud angles of his face. “You don’t have to practice in secret.”

Celegorm shifted uneasily, giving a half-shrug. “I… I thought—”

“Your mother and I fully support you if this is where your interests lie.” With slow steps Fëanor came to him, laying a hand on his shoulder. “We know you have spoken to Oromë.”

Celegorm’s head shot up. “Who told you?”

“I think you could make an educated guess.”

“Oh, Curvo will never hear the end of this.”

“Turcafinwë,” Fëanor said sternly, “you were gone for hours when you went to seek the Huntsman. We were worried, and Curufinwë merely answered our questions.” His voice gentled as Celegorm glowered at a point past his shoulder. “There is no need to be upset, nor is there any need to hide this from us. If you wish to join the Hunt, you may do so with our blessing.”

Fëanor’s words set emotion pounding under Celegorm’s skin like a second heartbeat; he was shaking with it as he said, “I can’t spend endless hours reading like Curvo, or mingling with every noble in Tirion like Nelyo, or—”

“You are not listening, Turcafinwë,” Fëanor interjected, and though he spoke firmly he also spoke with kindness. “You will be faced with many tasks both big and small in your life, but one of them rises in importance above the rest: you have to find something that lights a fire in your heart, then you have to do it with your whole being and do it well.” He regarded Celegorm with bright eyes. “You want to be a Hunter. Can you do it well?”

“Yes,” Celegorm said instantly, without a trace of a doubt. “I can. I _will_ , if I keep training. I need to prove myself to Oromë, to show him that I’m serious about becoming a Hunter. I’ve got until the twentieth day of _yávië_ to master the bow and arrow, and that night he will let me join the Hunt. If I manage to bring down a deer on my own, he will take me on as his pupil.”

Fëanor nodded, giving his shoulder a squeeze. “I will not delay you any longer, then.”

Celegorm hesitated, then looked up into his father’s face. “Will you come with me? I’ve been training on my own and I’m improving, but I can’t get my shoulders to relax and I don’t think my grip is quite right because I have calluses everywhere and my fingers keep slipping, and I know you’re busy but maybe—”

“Yes, Turcafinwë, I will come,” Fëanor said, and there it was again, his smile, lighting up his ageless face; it sent Celegorm’s heart soaring. “It will be my pleasure. Lead the way.”

2

“It will hurt.” Oromë’s deep voice rumbled through the forest, echoed by every bough and branch and living thing.

“I hope it does,” Celegorm grinned; blood was still streaked across his face from the Hunt, adrenaline flashing in his veins like gemstones, making him greedy and reckless.

For months he had begged Oromë to let him take his mark, a deer’s skull tattooed across the chest, and that night was no different. The light of Telperion was low, struggling to penetrate through the thick foliage, drenching the forest in a gentle darkness. Celegorm and Oromë were alone, sitting together by a crackling fire in a secluded clearing some metres distant from the rest of the Hunters.

“Are you sure, Tyelkormo?” Oromë asked, looking at him with eyes that burned gold in the firelight. “This cannot be undone.”

“ _Yes_ ,” Celegorm breathed, sharp and eager, “yes, I’m sure.” For a moment Oromë did not reply, merely watching him with those beautiful, inscrutable eyes, and Celegorm found himself incapable of enduring the silence. “I want this, Oromë, you know I do. Will you grant me this honour? Will you let me take your mark?”

At last Oromë sighed. “Yes, I will,” he said slowly, and Celegorm’s heart skipped a beat.

He lunged forward, crushing himself against Oromë’s bulk, capturing his lips in a rough kiss, more like a frenzied animal than a lover. Oromë accepted him as he always did, responding with measured violence, slow and controlled: allowing Celegorm to lose himself in the moment, but never pushing, never demanding.

Celegorm could not say how long it lasted; he only knew that his lips were swollen by the time Oromë pulled away, that his tongue brushed against a fresh wound left by Oromë’s teeth and came away stained red with his own blood.

“I’m ready,” he said in response to Oromë’s questioning gaze.

He lay flat on his back in the grass, tucking an arm behind his head, breath coming hot and fast from behind his teeth. Oromë came to kneel beside him, bearing no tools save his own hands.

“I am going to start,” Oromë told him, laying a heavy hand on his bare chest. “Let me know if you need a break.”

Celegorm was about to scoff at the idea—he was not known for needing _breaks_ —but Oromë had begun to chant, murmuring words in a language that Celegorm did not understand as his fingers traced gentle patterns over his chest, and an instant later the pain started. It was like nothing that Celegorm had ever experienced before. His skin burned, an invisible fire peeling him apart from the inside, Oromë’s power twining through every syllable of his chant and yoking Celegorm’s flesh to his will. Delicate lines opened into his skin, there the deer’s antlers and there its staring skull; they bled across his chest, dozens of little wounds that healed as soon as they were created and became indelible.

Celegorm bit back his screams until he couldn’t anymore, and then he _howled_ , deep and guttural, and kept howling until his voice broke; sweat beaded over every inch of his skin, his muscles locked tight, trembling so violently that he thought his _fëa_ would forsake his body and retreat to the painless darkness of the Halls of Mandos.

Eventually it was over, minutes later, maybe hours, maybe days. The pain was gone and the absence of it felt strange, like a vital part of him had been washed clean away. Celegorm lay unmoving, panting, drinking in the feel of his body as Oromë withdrew his power from him.

“Breathe, Tyelkormo,” Oromë said, wiping his sweaty, heated cheeks with a damp cloth. “You did well.”

“That wasn’t so bad.” Celegorm threw Oromë a lopsided grin, trying for his usual humour; but his smile faltered as he raised himself up on his elbows, each tiny movement sending a fresh bolt of pain through his chest.

Oromë let out a gentle breath of laughter, laying a hand on his shoulder to stop him from moving any further. “Take it easy for the rest of the night.”

“Now, now,” Celegorm chided, and he smiled again, more assuredly this time, an inviting curve of the lips, “that I cannot do.”

Oromë quirked an eyebrow at him. “We have eternity ahead of us, Tyelkormo. There will be other times for passion, as there will be other times for all things.”

But Celegorm wasn’t listening to him anymore. He batted Oromë’s hand away, pushing himself up into a sitting position. His eyes slipped to the new tattoo on his chest and he gasped, struck speechless by its beauty. It was graceful and primal all at once, the proud skull of a deer etched in dark red across his chest.

“Oromë…” he began, voice thick, fingers reverently tracing the lines and swirls of the tattoo; but he did not know what to say. _Thank you_ seemed insufficient, unable to even scratch the surface of the emotion that swelled in his chest, that filled him like light, like warmth, like holiness itself.

He wordlessly reached for Oromë, hands sliding over his broad shoulders and pulling him close, skin to skin. The tattoo on his chest seemed to _sing_ at the contact, and the rest of the world simply fell away, becoming nothing more than hungry mouths and wanting flesh until the night melted away into a golden dawn.

3

Laurelin was waning as Telperion grew bright, dappling the land in silver and gold. The air was warm; no breeze rustled the leaves in the woods of Oromë. There was no sound except for the chirping of unseen birds, and the soft grazing of Celegorm and Aredhel’s horses who were free to wander at their leisure.

“I will _die_ trying to keep up with you,” Aredhel groaned, watching in mixed horror and admiration as Celegorm finished his second bottle of wine. She stretched out her legs in front of her, leaning back with a hand planted on the grass as she took a swig from her own bottle.

“You’d drink heavily too if you had to put up with my family,” Celegorm retorted. He was sitting cross-legged next to Aredhel, and he reached over her, rummaging in the pack they had brought with them for another bottle of wine.

“It’s not all roses on my end either. Atar would probably say that I’d be better off committing treason than spending time with you.”

Celegorm let out a crude snort of laughter. He stuck the tip of his dagger squarely into the bottle’s cork, wrenching it out with practiced ease.

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” he said, giving Aredhel a dazzling grin.

“You should.”

They fell into a placid silence, watching the small white shapes of the clouds drifting across the patches of sky visible through the foliage.

“We should run away,” Celegorm said into the silence, and Aredhel turned to look at him, amusement bright in her face. “Take our horses and ride south, live off game and berries, see what the world is like beyond the borders of these woods.”

“You wouldn’t last long, Tyelko,” Aredhel teased, an easy grin spilling over her lips. “There is no wine out there, or whiskey, or any of the other liquors you are so fond of.”

But Celegorm didn’t return her smile. He wasn’t looking at her anymore, wasn’t looking at anything; his eyes were fixed, staring and unseeing, on the empty space between the boles of two huge and knotty trees.

“We cannot stay here forever,” he said, half to himself, voice fierce as though a fire blazed in his heart. “The world is so big, Írissë, and we are stuck in this web of politics and false smiles and words that don’t mean what they should.” He paused for a moment, and his fine features twisted into something that could have been sorrow or could have been rage. “We cannot stay here. The Corrupter walks freely among us, and they who sit the thrones of Aman call him redeemed, but have you noticed how no beasts will draw near to him, how a hush falls over the world wherever he goes, as though preparing for some doom to come? A Hunter learns of such things early on, and learns that they mean danger. I do not trust him.”

He made to take a generous gulp from his bottle, but Aredhel reached for him, curling her fingers around his wrist and keeping him still.

“I do not trust him either,” she said, and though her cheeks were flushed and her eyes were glassy from the wine, her tone was serious. “But we do not _have_ to trust him. We can turn our backs on him and live our lives in happiness as we have for so long.”

“I hope you are right, cousin,” Celegorm said, tilting his face upwards, seeming to listen intently to something only he could hear. “But I fear that the choice to live in happiness will soon be taken from us. The deer murmur uneasily among themselves. The insects chatter, and they tell of fear. Even the song of the birds has turned dark.”

Aredhel strained her ears, listening to the jaunty chirps of the birds, but she could hear none of the portents that Celegorm was talking about. It didn’t matter. She knew from experience that she should not doubt him; none among them were more attuned to the secret tongues of beasts than Celegorm.

“Is there anything we can do?” she asked, finishing her own bottle of wine; the aftertaste clung to her tongue and she grimaced, the pleasant buzz of the alcohol chased away by Celegorm’s words.

“I don’t know,” Celegorm whispered; but then he seemed to rouse himself, violently casting away whatever dark thoughts had gripped him, and he stood up, starting to pace with restless energy. “I want to go,” he said suddenly, letting out a whistle, and from beyond the trees his horse Súretal came trotting up to him.

Aredhel sprang to her feet, ignoring the way the world seemed to sway and blur around her. “Where?” she asked as Celegorm jumped into the saddle and Súretal, picking up on his energy, started pawing at the ground.

Celegorm laughed, a wild sound, as wild as the beasts he had befriended. “Come with me and you’ll see!”

Aredhel found herself laughing with him, sucked into his wildness, the infectious freedom of him. She thought of the trees marching southwards for miles and miles, green and quiet and lovely; she thought of the unexplored lands beyond the forest, and the Pélori rising eastward, crag upon steep crag bordering the world as she knew it.

“Yes, all right, it’ll do us both good to get away for a while,” she told Celegorm, her heart burning with a desire for wide lands and for wind in her hair. “You’re impossible, do you know that?”

“I might’ve been told that before,” he grinned, “once or twice.”

Aredhel rolled her eyes at him. She called for her own horse and then she bent down, quickly repacking their bag of provisions.

Once she was mounted, she turned to Celegorm with a sharp smile. “Race you to that stunted tree in the clearing south-east from here?”

Celegorm settled himself more comfortably in his saddle, lengthening his reins as Súretal stamped and snorted beneath him. “You’re on!” he called, and they both shot off into the darkening forest, galloping through the trees as Celegorm’s laughter filled the air.

4

The day was cold but bright, the sun riding high in a clear sky. Celegorm whistled an absent tune as he picked his way through the encampment on the shores of Lake Mithrim, a bowl of soup for his brother clasped in his hands.

Maedhros had returned to them beyond thought, beyond hope, not whole but close enough to it that most people were willing to overlook the missing pieces. The High King of the Noldor was here again; the oldest Fëanorian brother was here again. A crown upon a rightful head, a family reunited. Celegorm could practically hear the songs that would undoubtedly be sung around campfires and in taverns, bards and common folk alike being moved to recount the tale of Maedhros the Tall for many years to come.

Celegorm wondered if the songs would mention the blood and the scars, the pallor of Maedhros’ cheeks each time he jolted awake from a nightmare. He didn’t think anyone would be very interested in hearing about the ugly side of survival.

He paused before the entrance to Maedhros’ tent, carefully balancing the bowl in one hand as he rapped on the tent’s post with the other.

“Come in,” sounded Maedhros’ voice, a throaty rasp that was all he could manage these days; Celegorm ducked through the entrance into the warmth within.

A sickly smell permeated the tent, a smell of herbs and pungent pastes, of wounds and healing. Celegorm found himself longing for the crisp air outside.  
  
He tried not to wrinkle his nose for Maedhros’ sake. “I’ve brought you soup,” he said instead, with a lightness of voice he did not truly feel in his heart.  
  
It pained him to see his older brother like this, deeply, like a dislocated bone that had never been set back into its socket. Of all of them, seven brothers (six, Celegorm reminded himself sharply, _six_ brothers) who had set foot on the Hither Shore, Maedhros was the one who least deserved this cruelty; Maedhros, who had stood aside at Losgar as the flames had reflected off the water like blood and the ships had groaned and their baby brother had _burned_ ; Maedhros, who had agreed to parley with Morgoth’s foul captains, who had gone to the appointed meeting place with a heavy heart and a keen sword and a wild hope for peace.  
  
“I hope it’s not the chicken soup again,” Maedhros said, drawing Celegorm from his thoughts; he smiled, scarred lips twisting. “Even my prisoner’s fare had more flavour.”  
  
The humour was new, and it was disconcerting. Celegorm felt the sudden, stupid urge to cry. He viciously blinked back his tears; he hadn’t cried since he was a boy.  
  
“I’ll eat it, of course, even if it is the chicken soup,” Maedhros continued, oblivious to the emotion welling up in Celegorm’s chest, or choosing to be. “Wouldn’t want to offend the cook.”  
  
“I’ll have a word with Alarion,” Celegorm said, not quite managing to keep his voice from shaking. He sat down on the chair beside Maedhros’ bed, waiting for his brother to raise himself into a sitting position then gingerly perching the bowl of soup onto his lap.

“Don’t bother,” Maedhros replied, staring at his soup, or perhaps at his reflection in the soup. “It’s not worth it.”

“Anything that will make you happy is worth it.”

Maedhros shrugged and the motion was strange, stilted, his right shoulder in its brace not quite cooperating. He wrapped his fingers around the spoon resting in the bowl, beginning to eat his soup. It was slow and awkward, his left hand still trying to learn what the right had done so smoothly; but Maedhros did not ask for help and Celegorm knew better than to offer.

Instead, Celegorm simply continued to sit at his brother’s bedside, watching him eat in silence. It was warm in the tent, too warm, and it was making him restless. His throat felt tight, his fingers itching to touch Maedhros, to do something, to _un_ do what had been so cruelly done. He wanted to be outside, not here in this tent of sickness and bad memories; he wanted to be under the open skies with the wind in his hair and on his face, nothing but space stretching out before him as far as the eye could see.

An idea suddenly formed in his mind.  
  
“Will you go outside with me?” he asked his brother, who had hardly left his bed since Fingon had brought him back from the black spires of Thangorodrim.

Maedhros slowly set his spoon down. When he spoke, he sounded as though he was contemplating going to war.

“I suppose I have to, sooner or later.”

“You don’t,” Celegorm said quickly. “You never have to do anything against your will.”

“That is not quite true, is it?” Maedhros looked away, a sideways glance, a bitter curl of the lip; before Celegorm could reply, he added, “I’m so angry.”

“I am too.”

Maedhros shook his head, not acknowledging Celegorm’s words; perhaps he couldn’t, or perhaps he didn’t want to, not here in this space that was meant to be for him and him alone; Celegorm didn’t mind.

“I wanted to die,” Maedhros continued, voice softening. “I asked Finno to kill me, twice, the first time before Sorontar arrived and again as he was cutting my hand off. Sometimes I wish he had.”

Celegorm didn’t know what to say, didn’t know if there was anything to say; instead, he reached for Maedhros’ hand, gently, and Maedhros let him.

“I can’t talk about this with any of the others,” Maedhros continued, and he sat up a little straighter against his pillows, held his head a little higher. “You know what they’re like: Káno would fuss, and Moryo would sit in that silence of his that can be so loud, and Curvo would pace and say things he doesn’t truly mean, and Pityo, well… By rights, Pityo should take my share of the healers’ attention with the way he’s wandering about like a ghost.” Maedhros gave Celegorm’s hand a little squeeze. “It’s different with you, Tyelko. You understand death.”

“They understand death too—we all do.”

“No,” Maedhros said, softly, almost kindly, “they don’t. What they understand is war, and loss. Death that is violent, death that is cruel and needless. I’m talking about a different kind of death. A quiet death, a kind death.”

“A merciful death,” Celegorm murmured, thinking of his knife at the throat of an injured deer, of the silence afterwards, deep and peaceful.

Maedhros closed his eyes. “Yes.”

Celegorm could feel his heartbeat in his throat, deafening, suffocating. Nausea burned in his stomach, horror screamed through his skull; he hardly dared contemplate what Maedhros was saying. “I could never—”

“I’m not asking you to,” Maedhros said quickly and Celegorm sagged in his chair, suddenly lightheaded. “I cannot die. Someone has to make sure the five of you don’t set the continent aflame with your impulsive decisions.”

Celegorm found himself laughing, the sound bubbling up hysterical and irresistible from his chest. Maedhros laughed with him till they were both flushed and out of breath.  
  
“You never used to be funny before, Nelyo,” Celegorm grinned, and it was as if a weight had been lifted off his shoulders, off Maedhros’ shoulders too, and they could talk freely again as they used to in happier times.

“I’ll send my regards to Moringotto, then, shall I?” Maedhros said with a sharp smile of his own. “Complete with a handwritten thank-you note.”

Celegorm nodded sagely. “Anything less than that would be unforgivably rude.” They both fell silent, then, a gentle silence of deep thought and steady affection. At length Celegorm stirred; when he spoke again, his voice was quiet, tinged with simple honesty: “I’m glad you’re here.”

“It’s good to be here with you too, Tyelko.”

Celegorm looked upon his brother’s face for a moment longer, then he averted his eyes, moved but lacking the words for it.

Instead, he said, “Now, don’t be offended, but I must ask again: will you come outside with me?” He could not take Maedhros’ hurt away—he doubted if anyone could—but he could offer him this: the quiet of nature, the companionship of two brothers in the wide lands of a new world. “We can sneak round the back of the tent; there’s a path among the reeds that leads right down to the edge of the lake. No one ever goes there. We can watch the ducks, and I can tell you all the petty things that they’re squabbling about.”

A smile spread over Maedhros’ face, gentle and bright, and Celegorm thought back to a time when they all took such simple moments of happiness for granted.

“Yes, Tyelko, I will come,” Maedhros said, smile widening as Celegorm beamed at him. “Though I have one condition: I’d rather not hear about the squabbling of the ducks if they’re anything like our brothers!”

5

Night fell quickly on the borders of Doriath, and with it came darkness so complete that neither moon nor stars could be seen. Sorcery was thick in the air, perhaps the last remnant of the power of Melian, or perhaps something else entirely; for the Fëanorian army had come here with fell purpose, and as he stood beside Curufin gazing out at the silent trees, Celegorm felt watched as though the eyes of the Powers of Arda were fixed upon him.

Snow was falling, slow, sombre flakes that settled on Curufin’s shoulders and gleamed like ghostly silver in his hair. The woods were quiet, too quiet; Celegorm strained his ears for the murmurs of beasts, but heard nothing. It was a sign of danger, this hush that had fallen over the forest, a sign of an approaching predator. Celegorm knew better than to be afraid; peril walked where they did, doom sounded in their every footfall; this was all because of them.

“What happens next?” he asked into that unnatural silence.

Curufin did not deign to look at him. “You are aware of what war is, yes?” he said, cold and mocking. Celegorm thought about slapping him, but then decided against it; he didn’t want to spend this night on his own. “We march at dawn, and when we come across the enemy, we strike.”

Celegorm made a noncommittal sound in the back of his throat. “What then? Say we get the jewel—what do we do after that?”

“I never took you to be this stupid, Tyelko,” Curufin drawled with a derisive curl of the lip. “Surely you know the words of our Oath by now? After we wrest the jewels from the scum of the Thousand Caves, we turn our eyes north, and we prepare for battle.”

“Angamando cannot be assailed through force.”

“You never listen,” Curufin snapped. “Did I say anything about throwing down the walls of Angamando? We need the jewels. The fortress can stand for the next thousand years for all I care.”

Celegorm shook his head; there was a sadness in him that he could not shake, a crack right through the centre of his being that was widening with Curufin’s every word.

“It is a fool’s errand,” he murmured. “Moringotto will not fall by my hand or yours.”

“Is he not flesh and blood even as we are? You have heard Nelyafinwë: he is bound to his body. Every being with a beating heart can be killed.”

“It is _folly_.”

“Do not do this to us,” Curufin hissed, finally turning to look at Celegorm, eyes flashing. “Do not dare do this to me. The Oath drives us, the Oath _defines_ us. It is not your place to question it.”

“Curvo…” Celegorm began, reaching out to him, but Curufin roughly shrugged his hand away.

“ _Don’t_ ,” Curufin snarled, no longer cruel just for cruelty’s sake, but angry as Celegorm hadn’t seen him in too long. “Where is this coming from, brother? If it is treachery that fills your heart, then tell me now and I will put you to the sword before you bring us any more grief.”

At that Celegorm laughed, and even to his own ears it sounded mad. He felt wild, he felt _alive_ ; Curufin had wormed his way under his skin with his usual ease, lighting a fire in his heart. Celegorm imagined running into the woods, falling upon his own spear and, like his father before him, bursting into flames, a great crimson conflagration that would consume the proud trees of Doriath until there was nothing left of the kingdom but ash and cinders.

He wondered if his fire would spread even further, far enough to lick at the feet of the Valar on their cold thrones across the sea. The thought made his hands restless with violence.

“Don’t flatter yourself, little brother,” he spat at Curufin, baring his teeth. “I would tear your throat out before you even had the chance to blink.”

But where he had expected Curufin to respond, to kick and spit and hurt him, to seize that spark of anger within him and let it swallow him whole, he found himself staring into eyes that had gone wide with sudden realisation.

“I want it to be you,” Curufin whispered. “When my end comes, I want it to be your sword in my innards. No one else would _understand_. No one else would—”

“Hush,” Celegorm said quickly, his own fire snuffed out, leaving only tiredness in its wake; he took Curufin by the shoulder, giving him a little squeeze, and this time Curufin let him. “It doesn’t have to be me. It doesn’t have to be _anyone_. We don’t have to do this.”

It was a lie, and Celegorm knew it well as the words passed his lips; he had never been blessed with foresight, but he knew what his heart was telling him, and his bones, and every depth of his being—death was coming, and doom; such was the end of their road, the only end, no matter how many times their feet strayed.

“We _do_ ,” Curufin countered, voice soft as though they were children again, talking deep into the night and trying not to wake their parents. “Father—”

“Father is not here.” Celegorm sighed; he gave Curufin’s shoulder one last squeeze, then let his hand fall away. “You can drown the whole continent in blood and you still won’t feel like you’ve avenged his death. You know this, Curvo. You must know this.”

Curufin shook his head; his expression hardened, and caught amid the drifting snowflakes, his face seemed to be made not of flesh but of marble, pale and proud. “This is hardly the time, Tyelko.”

“It’s never a good time to talk about these things, but still, we must.”

Curufin scoffed. “Save your pithy epigrams for Makalaurë.”

He turned away, starting to head back towards the encampment. Celegorm was left staring at the empty space next to him, and it seemed to yawn wide as a grave. He shivered suddenly, with a cold that had little to do with the falling snow; instinctively he lunged after Curufin, wrapping urgent fingers around his wrist, dragging him back until that terrible emptiness was no longer empty.

“Do you trust me, Curvo?”

Curufin shot him a strange look. “Yes.”

“Will you follow me into the Thousand Caves?”

“That is what we are here for, you absolute—”

“Then promise me that you will follow me out of the Thousand Caves too, and then east, over the mountains, away from all of this. We can have peace, Curvo. We will have peace, for one year, ten years, twenty, however long it lasts.”

“If I were kind, I would call you delusional. As it is—”

“Promise me,” Celegorm pressed, words hot and desperate, fingers tightening around Curufin’s wrist until he knew he was leaving bruises on his skin. “Promise me this, and I will ask nothing else of you for as long as I live.”

“Yes, all right, if this means so much to you,” Curufin said after a long moment; he made no move to extricate himself from Celegorm’s grip. “We get the jewel, and then you can have your semblance of peace.”

6

The house had remained almost unchanged through all the long years of Celegorm’s absence: the same home in the glittering heart of Tirion, the same doors and the same corridors, the same furniture and the same windows and the same light through the windows. But no, that wasn’t quite right—the light was different, subtly, less glow than glare, less gentle, less enduring.

The statues were new, too. Elves and beasts rendered in marble, cold eyes gazing out on the empty corridors. They were the faces of strangers, or so Celegorm thought until he found himself staring at them one morning a few days after his release from the Halls of Awaiting. The Elf had caught his eye; the statue was tall, taller than him, and the sunlight fell onto a face that was noble and sad all at once. Celegorm traced his fingers over a slanted cheekbone, a smooth jaw, and then suddenly he realised what he was looking at: the eyes were Maedhros’ eyes, the nose Curufin’s, the mouth his own.

He heard soft footsteps behind him, and turned to look down into the face of his mother.

“They make the house feel less empty,” Nerdanel said, giving Celegorm a smile that did little to dispel the sorrow in her eyes.

“It is a big house for just one person.”

Nerdanel nodded. “I thought about moving back in with your grandfather, or finding a smaller place outside of Tirion, but there are so many memories here that I couldn’t bring myself to leave behind.” She stepped up to the statue, cupping its cheek, looking at it with a tenderness that made Celegorm’s chest ache. “You all grew up in this house. Staying here was my way of grieving you.”

“Ammë,” Celegorm whispered, feeling young all of a sudden, young and helpless in the face of Nerdanel’s grief plunging beneath the surface like a bottomless sea. “Ammë, I’m so sorry, I—”

“Oh, Tyelko.” Nerdanel turned to him and her hands were on his cheeks now, her warm, callused hands holding him as they had done all those years ago. “A child should never have to comfort their parent in their grief.”

“I’m not a child anymore.”

“You are to me.”

At that Celegorm pouted, and Nerdanel laughed, teasing and loving all at once.

“I truly am sorry,” he said once her laughter had faded away. “We should never have left like we did. We got caught up in the madness of it all, Atar’s words and the darkness and the bright glitter of our swords.”

Her hands slipped from his face; there was a hardness to her words as she said, “I know, Tyelko. I know what Fëanáro was like.”

“He is answerable for some of the deeds that happened when we left, and after we left, but not all,” Celegorm countered; he had done much thinking during his time in the Halls, and had come to many conclusions. “None of us were blameless in the end.”

“I know that too. You and your brothers accomplished much, and there is much to be proud of, but your time on the Hither Shore was steeped in sorrow and, I daresay, cruelty also.”

Celegorm ran a hand through his hair, leaving it mussed about his shoulders. “How much do you know?”

“Enough.” Nerdanel sighed, moving away towards one of her other statues, brushing a curl of dust off its shoulders. “I have spent many a day in the Halls of Awaiting during my years of solitude. You have seen them too, I am sure, the tapestries that cover the walls of those sombre Halls, telling the story of the world and of all the little lives in it.” She moved to the next statue, and then the next, touching a marble hand or blowing the cobwebs off a marble head. “You should come with me next time I go. You can say hello to Ambarussa. He would dearly like to see you.”

“Telvo?” Celegorm frowned, looking up and down the hallway as if he might find a hint of his brother’s existence, some forgotten footprint or long-lost strand of his auburn hair. “I thought that the _fëar_ in the Halls were not permitted to interact with the living.”

“He is among the living,” Nerdanel clarified, continuing on to the next statue, but this time she did not touch it; she merely stood before it, looking upon its sculpted face, and Celegorm thought that of all the statues this one resembled Amras the most. “He did not spend a long time in the Halls, not initially. He came back to me and we resumed our lives, or tried to, at least. He has always shared a strong bond with his brother, but it proved to run deeper than I think any of us truly realised. It was torture for him, being alone, living a half-life. He could not endure such profound unhappiness, and I could not ask him to endure it for my sake alone.” She cast a brief glance in Celegorm’s direction, and though her voice was steady, her eyes were very bright. “I sent him to his grandmother Míriel and he is still with her to this day, weaving the history of our people as he waits for his brother.”

Something swelled in Celegorm’s chest, something huge and aching as though his heart had grown too big for the rest of him. “I should have protected him.”

Nerdanel made a soft noise. “Many things should have been done, and many more should not have been done.”

Celegorm went to her as she stood before the statue; he went to her and he took her sculptor’s hand within his own, and held her as though his trembling fingers against hers could make up for her grief and her solitude and her unshed tears.

“Do you forgive me, Ammë?” he asked her in a whisper that was too loud in that great, empty house.

Nerdanel regarded the statue for a moment longer. “No,” she said gently, kindly. “You know as well as I do that your deeds are unforgivable, and absolution for them would not be mine to give even if such a thing were possible.” She paused, finally turning away from the statue to give him her full attention. “But that does not change the fact that you are my son. I love you deeply, no less so than when you were a babe in arms. What was done cannot now be undone, and our old selves cannot be restored to us. All we can do is move forward.” She brushed the messy strands of hair out of his face, giving him a smile that was warm as a living flame. “We are makers, Tyelkormo. We are here and we are whole, and that is all we need to make this family anew.”


End file.
